Girls BB team drops three games

"A few girls that haven't seen the floor in awhile came in and really gave us some quality minutes. Aryn Eckstrom had a good game with 11 points and six rebounds, Julia followed with 10 points, Devon Flohrs played a well rounded game with six points, eight rebounds and she played solid defense. Emily Hurley scored seven points, had eight rebounds and two assists."

The St. James Gym witnessed another parents night, which was the last home game of the year for the girls basketball team and four SJA seniors.

The Saints seniors Aryn Eckstrom, Devon Flohrs, Emily Hurley, Michaela Nordby and their teammates fell to the GFW Thunderbirds by a score of 59-53.

In a classy touch, Head Coach Adam Schroeder started all four of his seniors.

While it would have been nice for the seniors to get a win in their last home game, a GFW eighth grade bomber had a different plan.

Not yet in high school Hailey Busse bombed the Saints with six three point shots. GFW had eight threes on the night. The Saints had only one trey on 1-13 three point shooting. Busse had 26 points for the game.

That precision long range bombing, and SJA’s inability to match it was the difference in the game.

Busse, a petite long range bomber, is a player the Saints are going to have to account for any time the Saints take on this team in the next four years.

It was another night where the girls had a subpar shooting effort. Overall, the Saints shot 30 percent for the night and 35 percent of their two point attempts and 60 percent from the free throw line.

Emily Hurley led the Saints with 17 points and as she has many times this year made it a double, double with 14 rebounds.

Julia Beckius had 16 points.

In the first minute of the game the Saints got out to a 4-0 lead, but GFW was zeroed in from beyond the arc early in the game and opened up a 15-8 lead at the 12 minute mark. The Saints fell behind by 10 at 10:50 in the first half.

GFW’s shooting expanded the Thunderbird’s lead to 29-15 with 5:45 to go. The Saints got it under ten to trail 34-25 at the half.

The Thunderbirds kept bombing and the Saints kept missing through the first seven minutes of the second half to trail 51-33.

From that point on it was a much different game. SJA went on a 20-8 run in the last eleven and a half minutes and an 11-2 run in the last four minutes.

The Saints got as close as four points trailing 57-53, but the rally ran out of time as there were only 13 seconds on the clock when SJA got that close.

Page 2 of 2 - The big difference was better shooting down the stretch for the Saints. Also, better defense helped the Saints and perhaps GFW tried to sit on their lead a bit too much.

So the Saints outscored the visitors 28-25 in the second half, but the girls fell in too big a hole to come all the way back.

SJA lose to BEA

After a big come back produced a close loss at home, the Saints hit the road to BEA and lost. It wasn’t close as the Saints fell 56-22.

There have been nights this year where the Saints have shot poorly and the game against BEA ranks about as bad as it could get. For the game the Saints shot 16 percent.

BEA blew out to a 41-16 halftime lead. SJA managed to score only six points in the second half.

No Saints were in double figures. Julia Beckius and Emily Hurely each had five points. Beckius led the team in rebounds with five of the teams 19 rebounds.

The Saints only had seven offensive rebounds and that combined with poor shooting was a big factor in SJA only having 37 field goal attempts in the game.

Of their 22 points, nine were free throws, where the Saints were 9-18.

GHEC beats SJA

The girls basketball Saints lost another road game Tuesday night by the score of 56-41.

GHEC opened a big lead in the first half. The SJA girls fell behind 15-0 at the start of the game. The Saints narrowed the lead and trailed at half 25-17.

The Saints pulled into a tie in the second half at 32, but GHEC pulled away for the win.

Head Coach Adam Schroeder said part of the problem of sustaining the run in the second half was, “ Julia Beckius and Emily Hurley got into foul trouble. That really hurt us.”

The positive to that according to the coach was, “A few girls that haven't seen the floor in awhile came in and really gave us some quality minutes.

“Aryn Eckstrom had a good game with 11 points and six rebounds, Julia followed with 10 points, Devon Flohrs played a well rounded game with six points, eight rebounds and she played solid defense.